So now that my engine rebuild is complete, I figured I should share some pictures of my car and the story behind it, and how I got it.
Most recent picture of my Dart:
I bought this 1970 Dodge Dart back in 2002, a senior in High School. It had around 84,000 miles on it. At the time I really wanted an older Dodge, and had been looking at anything I could get near, or get my hands on. This car was bought new in California, and the person who owned it willed it to a family in my town in Minnesota in the late 1980's. Once that family got the car, it mostly stayed in a shed, collecting dust, and having boxes, ladders and other items stored on it or against it. The body has quite a few dings and dents because of this, but most are pretty small. There is some mild rust on the driver side door.
When I first looked at this car, I knew I liked it, but I also didn't fully love it. It ran well enough, and had it's flaws, so I made an offer on it. The owners at the time thought about it, and turned me down. They knew they could get a better offer from someone with money rather than a poor High School student, who was working to go to Tech College as well.
So a full year went by, and the owners attempted to sell this car. Pretty much everyone that they talked to wanted to ditch the Slant Six engine, and make the car into more of a muscle car or drag car since the body was in such great shape. However, the owners had sentimental value, and wanted to see it stay original.
After that year went by, the rear breaks started to leak. So when they brought out the car again to attempt to sell it, they found it had the break issue, and gave me a call asking if I was still interested in it. I said yes, and they agreed to sell me the car at the price I had offered the year before, under the condition that I keep it original. I went to work, replacing the wheel cylinders, and the bad heater core (Heater core was looped off years before I ever saw the car). I also changed the belts, hoses, spark plugs, distributor cap, and all the normal maintenance.
Picture of me and friends working on the car from 2002
Once I had all the work done, I daily drove the car for a little over a year and a half. I took it from Minnesota to Wyoming to Tech Collage. The 70 Dart made the trip back and forth 3 times. I washed it as much as I could, and kept a car cover over it to protect it as best as I could at the time. Once I was back home in Minnesota, and started working jobs, I was able to put the car into storage and buy a cheep (yet more than I paid for the 70 Dart) Jeep to drive daily. At that point, the 70 Dart became the car I would take to car shows, and cruise ins, and it treated me very well. Though I did have to replace the break master cylinder in 2006. I changed jobs here and there, and grew in my profession after leaving the mechanics life pretty early on. In 2007 I went to a family reunion. While there, I asked my cousin if she knew any dealerships that had new Dodge Chargers, and she said "I know where there is a yellow one!"
Hearing those words made my eyes wide. "Take me there now!"
I fell in love with that car instantly, and contacted the dealership during the week, working out details on how I was going to purchase it.
So now I owned two cool cars! I daily drove the 2006 Dodge Charger Daytona, and switched off every other week what car I drove to cruise ins, or on rare occasions allowed a family member to take one to the shows as well.
During 2007, I found that the Slant Six had a cracked exhaust manifold. It was probably cracked since I bought it in 2002, but I finally found the crack while examining it closer. So I worked with friend and found a used OE manifold that was still in once piece, and replaced it. However, I didn't have the two manifolds planed by a machine shop. The car worked fine in 2007, and there were no major issues.
However, in 2008 when I got the Dart back out after the winter months, I noticed it didn't idle well. The intake manifold was sucking in air, and causing the car to kill at idle. The odometer had just turned over 100,000 miles, and while attempting to put the car back into storage, the starter died. That is when I decided that a full engine rebuild would be a great idea.... and it took me till now to finally complete it. I'm glad it's done, and I hope I never have to do that much work again, but I'm so glad to have this car back in my life!
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